Disclaimer: I don't own. I don't profit.

Special thanks to beta Notes from a Classroom. Check out her latest, "People Will Say" in my faves.

NOTE: So a lot of people have been having trouble picturing boy!Uhura. And something occurred to me; girl!Spock has her own name. Maybe boy!Uhura needs a first name, too. I've gone back and retroactively changed his name to Noyoto wherever the story is in his POV. The name is at the suggestion of Nyotarules (thank you NR!) It doesn't mean anything, but I'm going to make it mean something in "New Swahili." Hey, it's sci fi and 200 years in the future. New Swahili could exist!)

Chapter 8

As a rule, Vulcans were not a fond of cold or damp, but T'Spock was relieved to get out of Sharpton's house into the Marin County fog. Her equilibrium was off, and she knew it. She wanted to be alone, to think, to escape inane chatter about soccer players.

Flipping open her comm, she used its dim light to find her way down to the road to the transporter station.

The last time she saw Telim was on Earth, a year into her training at Starfleet. Josef, Esther and Rachel had invited her over for dinner. Just before the meal was served, Rachel left the table to answer the door saying, "T'Spock, we have a surprise guest." A few moments later she was back, a tall Vulcan at her side. Telim had changed so much that T'Spock almost didn't recognize him. He'd grown taller; his hands no longer seemed too large for his body. His face was all angles, his boyish softness lost.

Josef had smiled wide at T'Spock, gestured to Telim, and said, "My latest recruit. I'm not above poaching from the Vulcan Science Academy."

"I was poached?" said Telim. "I was assured that I would be treated with respect the VSA did not afford me; now you compare me to a game animal."

For a moment there was silence. Then Rachel laughed, and one of Telim's brows rose infinitesimally.

"I respect my quarry," Josef said, smiling again.

The rest of the evening should have been uncomfortable, but it was not. T'Spock, Telim and the humans fell into easy conversation.

When Telim insisted on escorting her back to Starfleet, T'Spock almost didn't feel uncomfortable. But then just as the academy had come into view, Telim said, "T'Spock, I am still unbonded."

She shouldn't have been surprised by that. Telim had strong bonds with his family. He was, despite the tragedy of the loss of his bond mate and the prejudice of their fellow Vulcans, a very stable individual; his cycles had not yet begun.

"My offer still stands," he said as they drew closer to the gate.

T'Spock had felt the panic again. The sensation of a door being shut. "As does my answer," she said.

That was the last time they had spoken.

The darkness of the long road to the transporter station stretched before her. Her comm beeped that its battery was running low. Stopping, T'Spock lifted it and punched a few buttons to shut off everything but the light function.

She should be happy for Telim and for Rachel. Why did she feel so empty?

She couldn't imagine Telim boring her with discussions about soccer. Really, her affection for Uhura was misplaced.

Restraining a shiver, she reset her internal thermostat. And then a shape writhing on the road before her caught her attention.

x x x x

Noyoto hung onto the hover hand grip as Patrick tore out of Sharpton's driveway. In front, Katie said, "Easy, she's probably just fine."

"Why didn't you stop her?" the Lieutenant Commander said.

Noyoto bristled. Teeth clenched, he said, "She ordered me not to...Sir."

Patrick cursed in Klingon with surprising fluency.

"Shhh..." said Katie, blonde curls bouncing as the hover lurched down the road. Outside, a Marin County mist had begun to settle over the forest. The hover's lights only penetrated a few meters into the night.

"There are crazy people out there," said Patrick. "You've seen the xenofreaks on the news and she's not answering her comm."

Katie sighed.

"I'll watch this side, Katie," Noyoto said.

"Right," she answered. "I'll keep my eyes peeled over here."

Noyoto felt the cold, moist air acutely, and paradoxically felt too warm. His teeth clenched again. He knew the odds of T'Spock getting into any trouble were infinitesimally small. And yet...

When Noyoto was a teenager, there was a story in the news feeds of a young man in the town over who had been driving his sister home late one evening. The two had argued. The sister insisted on getting out of the hover and walking home, and the brother let her. The girl never came home. There were manhunts for weeks.

As the road stretched ahead, gray and empty, he thought of that young man now. He thought of the missing sister, and all the things that could have befallen her - everything from a lion attack, to more chilling scenarios: death at the hands of a human.

There were mountain lions near Muir Woods, and wherever there were humans...Noyoto wiped his face. His skin was damp with the thick humidity of the cool air. He felt worn and spent, the cumulative affect of having spent too much time in the lab for the last few weeks.

"We're almost at the station," said Katie as a traffic signal came into view. For the first time she sounded worried.

The trees fell away and they were on the well-lit road leading to the main transport station.

Where was T'Spock?

"She couldn't have gotten here that fast," said O'Hara. "Could she?"

"I'm getting out," said Noyoto. "You said you had a flashlight, Sir?"

"In the glove compartment," said Katie. "Hang on."

Swinging out to the side of the hover, Noyoto took the flashlight proffered by Katie through the window.

Patrick nodded at him. "We'll check the station just in case and then swing back around for you. Your comm on?"

Pulling his comm from his pocket, Noyoto popped it open and it beeped. Saluting with it in his hand he said, "Yes, sir."

And then he turned back down the road and ran.

x x x x

T'Spock squatted in the ditch off the side of the road. Her pants legs wet with water from the misted plants, in front of her eyes she held a stick. Perching on said stick was the form of the small creature she'd rescued from the road, a nearly perfect specimen of Ariolimax californicus. The slug's eye stalks waved frantically towards the light of T'Spock's dim comm and it tilted the anterior portion of its small body towards her. That would never do. Turning off her comm, T'Spock put the stick on the ground.

Behind her on the road she heard some hovers speed by.

After seven minutes and twenty-three seconds, T'Spock turned her comm back on and verified that the small creature was oozing its way into the undergrowth.

Dimly she was aware of the sound of someone running in the distance. Perhaps they were jogging. T'Spock enjoyed running at night, too, without the distractions of traffic, or people.

She continued to watch the Ariolimax, utterly fascinated by it. It was such a wonderfully alien thing. On Vulcan it would have desiccated, but here in the wet woods of earth it flourished. A bit of shine beyond the Ariolimax caught T'Spock's eye. It was another slug. T'Spock tilted her head. They were hermaphrodites, and of limited intellectual capacity. When they met there would be no awkward confusion, no thought of ramifications. They would mate and then be on their way. She was almost envious.

The footsteps were coming closer. By speed and sound T'Spock estimated they belonged to a human male. She calculated the odds that said male would be a threat, and decided they were minuscule.

Putting her hands on the wet Earth she leaned down closer to watch the two destined lovers. In the dim light of the comm she saw their eye stalks wave in the direction of the other. Did they sense each other already? T'Spock's knowledge of mollusks was woefully inadequate. When she got home she'd remedy that situation immediately.

A light danced on the ground beside her.

"T'Spock!"

Starting at Uhura's voice, she turned, putting up a hand to block the beam of light bouncing in her eyes.

"Are you alright! What happened?" Uhura was at her side now, squatting low, a hand on her shoulder shaking her.

"I am fine." Pushing the hand away she said, "Why are you touching me and what are you doing here?"

Uhura's hand dropped. His brows drew together. "What am I...? Patrick, Katie and I are looking for you, on orders from Commander Sharpton. Your comm is off and it's dangerous out here! What where you thinking, leaving the party like that?"

"It is hardly more dangerous than Vulcan, and I was bored," said T'Spock.

"Yeah, whatever," said Uhura running a hand over his shaved head. "You've been in a bad mood ever since you saw your boyfriend with that Rachel...whoever...!"

T'Spock should have responded quickly, should have said that Vulcans didn't have boyfriends, but she found herself unable to speak.

This is why she liked him. Because he knew her...somehow.

His hands danced furiously in the air, his brow was shining in the low light. "I saw you in this...this...ditch...and...What the Hell were you doing, Sir?"

She tilted her head at the profanity. It was odd of him to swear at her, and technically she could write him up for it. She blinked. Beads of sweat were on his brow.

"There was an Ariolimax californicus crawling across the road," she said. "I relocated it."

"A what?" said Uhura.

A hover engine was nearing.

"I believe the common name is banana slug," said T'Spock.

Staring at her, Uhura took a deep breath. The hover lights fell on them and Uhura turned away muttering in a language that surprisingly T'Spock did not understand.

x x x x

Noyoto sat in the back of the hover, T'Spock in the seat opposite to him. He was damp with sweat from his long run and cold. Shivering and gritting his teeth, he gave a sidelong look at T'Spock.

She was looking at him, head tilted.

Noyoto rolled his eyes away. She was just...so...so...weird.

When he'd seen her there bent over in the ditch he'd imagined the worst, that she'd obviously been attacked by something or someone and had barely pulled herself away. Going cold, his heart stopping, he'd silently cursed himself for following orders and letting her go out alone.

But no, no, his alien superior officer had merely been side tracked by a misplaced fascination with a slug. Which he'd only discovered after he'd made a fool of himself.

"Cadet Uhura, are you quite alright?" T'Spock said.

Noyoto looked at her. She was so incredibly...cute...and hot...and he wanted to strangle her for making him worry more than he ever had in his entire life.

"Hey Uhura, are you alright?" said Patrick.

Noyoto glanced up to see Patrick's eyes in the rear view mirror.

"You look a little pale," said Katie.

Unable to help himself, Noyoto snorted a short laugh. Being called pale by a blond woman.

"Relatively pale," said Patrick.

Shivering, Noyoto turned his eyes to the window next to him and stared out into the darkness.

"Cadet Uhura?" said T'Spock. Her voice sounded very far away.

"It's cold in here," Noyoto said to no one in particular.

"You Africans," said O'Hara. "Just wait until you get on a starship." His voice faded away and Uhura thought he heard Katie saying something but her words seemed to run together meaninglessly.

A banana slug. All that worry over a banana slug. And a pissy mood brought on by...

He blinked. She hadn't denied it when she called the Vulcan guy in the holovid her boyfriend.

His eyes widened. That opened up some really interesting possibilities...which he would think about when he wasn't so hot, or so cold, or tired.

"Cadet Uhura, give me your hand."

Noyoto's head drooped against the side of his seat and he smiled. He realized a moment before T'Spock might actually...date...or something...and then she asked for his hand. He laughed softly.

"That is an order, Cadet."

Shaking his head and offering her his hand, he said, "That was fast."

She didn't answer, just took his hand in her own smaller one. It was soft, and dry, but not as hot as he'd imagined it to be. Not that he was complaining.

The fingers of her other hand drifted to his wrist, which was mmmm...his stomach was suddenly filled with happy butterflies. What an absolute sap he was.

But...

Why did he feel so worried all of a sudden?

"We need to go to a hospital," said T'Spock.

"Lieutenant T'Spock," he mumbled, "I thought you weren't hurt."

His eyes closed for only a moment and suddenly he was blinking at bright lights that weren't the transport station. T'Spock's hand was still on his, and Noyoto felt a curious sensation, not precisely sexual, and yet reminiscent of that sensation he felt when his body was joined with a woman. He felt as though their thoughts and bodies were intertwined, as though they were one being.

Katie and Patrick were getting out of the hover, and Patrick was yelling at someone.

He didn't need to yell. Everything would be okay. Noyoto could feel it. Squeezing T'Spock's hand experimentally, he felt the urge to kiss her fingers.

The world went hot and cold and black.

Noyoto opened his eyes to bright lights and McCoy's face above him. A young man and a woman in hospital blues milled at the edges of his vision. He could hear the chatter of staff and hum of machines. He felt completely alone.

"Welcome back to the land of the living," said McCoy.

T'Spock's face appeared above him. Her eyes met his. Noyoto couldn't let those eyes go. He felt weak and drained and still too hot, but he wanted to touch her again, just to put his hand on hers.

"Please give us a moment alone, Lieutenant," said McCoy to T'Spock.

Noyoto wanted to protest, but the energy involved in that simple act was apparently too much. As he lay mute, T'Spock nodded at the doctor and then disappeared.

Turning back down to Noyoto McCoy said, "You apparently have a case of Andopnemonia."

Noyoto let out a breath of air. He knew what that meant, and he was sure T'Spock probably knew, too.

"So," said McCoy, "You been kissing any Andorians lately?"

A/N:

Thanks for your patience everyone. If you enjoyed please leave a review!